Author: Zoe

and then I lost the rest of the day watching music documentaries, so I thought I’d blog the very incomplete list to make sharing easier.

Alchemists of Sound
Looks at BBC Radiophonic Workshop from its inception, through its golden age when it was supplying music and effects for cult classics like Doctor Who, Blake’s Seven and Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy, and charts its fading away in 1995 when, due to budget cuts, it was no longer able to survive.

Bassline Bassline
A video essay that investigates the invention, failure and subsequent resurrection of the mythic Roland TB-303 Bass Line music machine in the last two decades of the 20th century.

Can I Get An Amen?
A perspective of perhaps the most sampled drum beat in the history of recorded music, the Amen Break. It begins with the pop track Amen Brother by 60’s soul band The Winstons, and traces the transformation of their drum solo from its original context as part of a ‘B’ side vinyl single into its use as a key aural ingredient of Drum’n’Bass.

In between all this she also created the avatar service stortroopers, which is still online. Her current project MakieLab, a startup developing customisable, 3D-printed, game-enabled toys, sounds very interesting so far. I can’t wait to see the results.

Skud also deserve a special mention for her tireless work and thoughtful comments in the nymwars.

I’ve been thinking about getting some sort of mobile broadband for a while now. Both as a backup for my home connection and to use out and about. My orginal plan was to upgrading my d420 to a netbook with builtin 3G, particularly the samsung n230 but since it does not look like the 3G version will be out in the Uk anytime soon I’ve just went for a MiFi instead on pay as you go.

For those who have not been following the games development, APB is an MMO created by Realtime Worlds, set in the near future where vigilantism have been legalised, so a big game of cops and robbers in an urban setting. You can play as ether an Enforcer or as a Criminal, with Clans and Parties, all normal MMO features. Dave Jones (creator of GTA) is one of the main people behind the game and Realtime Worlds, and off the back of Crackdown it has been much anticipated. It use a different payment model to most MMOs, playtime can be purchased per hour or 30 day unlimited (GameSetWatch has a nice article on the Psychology of this.)

Europe didn’t have the cheap local phone calls, so BBS‘s took longer to be come popular (which are documented in Jason Scott‘s great series) but I would say the demoscene and the cracker culture it grew out of was our starting point. Lots of (especially) gamedevelopers got their start in the scene and provided that same focus mostly around the Amiga. Giving european hackers culture a different style and shape.

Electronics like VLSI is one of those area that is seen as the dirtier end of technology all workbenches and soldering iron but women are making contribution and running successful businesses in these areas, so don’t be put off, get involved.